


Aconitum Napellus

by ApollonDeuxMille



Category: Gotham (TV)
Genre: Implied Relationships, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-06
Updated: 2016-06-06
Packaged: 2018-07-12 16:09:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7112932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApollonDeuxMille/pseuds/ApollonDeuxMille
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>‘You cannot deny this is a service to the city,’ whispers Oswald.</p>
<p>The ghost of a smile might have just flickered in the corners of Jim’s mouth. His head droops a little and a deep, golden tendril of his ever lengthening forelock falls into his tired eyes. He has surrendered.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Aconitum Napellus

**Author's Note:**

> A short response to a writing prompt of "a story that involves a countdown. Start the story at 10 and finish at 0." This is also post on my Tumblr blog @delicatelyserved.

_Ten._

Oswald is working on the floor tonight, behind the bar, which is unusual. It’s unwise. He’s normally in his best booth when he’s down here at peak times. Tonight he’s pretending to polish hock glasses, jacket off and cuff-links winking madly as he works the stemware. 

_Nine._

Nearly all of the patrons to _Oswald’s_ are regulars, and they know to give the man himself a wide berth. They huddle at the other end of the bar to order their drinks, used to him but still wary, as if he is a large spider in the corner that hasn’t moved for a few days. The bartenders are more flighty, they recognise the flavour of Oswald’s mood tonight.

_Eight._

There is a man being entertained at a premium booth near the stage, where the permanent Thursday act performs. She is singing modern songs in a husky, Julie London patois, and makes a gallant effort with her appearance to look the part, though she falls short and offers only a lurid imitation of Jessica Rabbit. Oswald had given her the green light weeks ago, she sings well every Thursday evening and the man in the premium booth is predictably enthralled. 

_Seven._

By now Oswald has accidentally broken two hock glasses, one palm is oozing red as other vacantly dabs at the mess with the polishing cloth. He doesn’t care, it is just the whisper of pain compared to all that he’s felt before. He clenches and squeezes the blood out between his fingers, only mildly fascinated by the sight of it these days. 

_Six._

The time draws near, so he slides towards the end of the bar, his pretence of cleaning glasses given up. He can see everyone in the booth now. The man has brought his permanently affixed companion, the kind that will go at you with a bat wrapped in barbed wire if his boss says he’s unhappy with you. Oswald’s eyebrows twitch, wondering why he didn’t think of that. Gabe and Butch though, who are also in the booth, would probably think of something like that on their own.

_Five._

This is it. The singer always does a sensual number at the end of her set, descending from the stage to glide amongst the tables and tease the patrons. Her tips are enormous, often in denominations no lower than $20. She has learnt who gives best, and swans towards her best tipper of the last four weeks. The man in the booth.

_Four._

Oswald’s eyes are glittering olivine as he watches his long play enter the final act. Months of punctilious forethought are culminating beautifully into an event that will place him four more moves ahead of his opponents than if he’d gone in shotguns blazing. His singer toys with her decadent lavalier, Oswald’s gift to her. She’s making her move, and Gabe and Butch dutifully play their parts, merrily clinking drinks and puffing billowing clouds of cigar smoke as they laugh, making sure the man and his muscle are far from focused on the way the singer’s hand is dangerously close to his drink. Oswald grins, all yellow stains and plaque. 

_Three._

Someone taps his shoulder. Oswald hisses, but the barman just nods towards the door. It’s Jim Gordon, sleek and sculpted in his suit like a roan stallion. His hair is messy from a long working day and he has an ugly, yellowing bruise on his eye socket. Oswald can’t believe it. Ever the fly in the ointment, Jim can easily be relied on to arrive at precisely the wrong moment.

_Two._

He’s across from Oswald at the bar, staring hard into his eyes. He does that a lot. Tonight Oswald can’t take this, so his sight flickers over Jim’s shoulder to the table, catching the singer’s eye. She nods, she’s done her job. He sees Butch and Gabe give their signal, cigars simultaneously stubbed. It’s all over. Oswald shares his gaze with Jim again, a vague relief, until a warm hand spreads across his bloody fingers. His long nostrils flare and all the knots inside tighten.

_One._

‘Don’t do it.’

‘It’s already done.’

Jim takes a sharp breath through gritted teeth, crushing the spindly, pale fingers in his grasp for a moment. He’s always so frustrated with Oswald.

‘You didn’t have to do it. We were so close. We had _evidence.’_

He won’t let go of Oswald’s hand.

‘Good! I’m expecting it to all come out in the papers once they’ve buried him. Aconite doesn’t take long, you know, and neither do mob funerals.’ 

Oswald tilts his head like an idiotically arrogant pigeon, with thin, angry lips and blotches of pink fury rising underneath his smattering of freckles and blemishes. Jim is looking at Oswald’s hand which he has somehow coaxed open, his thumb gently pressing into the bloody, wounded heart of his palm. The heat between their skin is unbearable.

‘You cannot deny this is a service to the city,’ whispers Oswald.

The ghost of a smile might have just flickered in the corners of Jim’s mouth. His head droops a little and a deep, golden tendril of his ever lengthening forelock falls into his tired eyes. He has surrendered.

‘Why did you have to do it like this? Such a drawn out plan, no gore? No statement?’

At the booth the man, looking clammy and uncomfortable already, is fussing to leave with his dour henchman, saying his goodbyes to Butch and Gabe and waving clumsily at the singer. She’s completed what she was planted at the club to do at long last, so she ignores him. A perfect ice queen. Oswald is pleased.

‘I need the remaining factions of the old families to mourn him in earnest before the press drops the story.’

Jim blinks. He doesn’t understand.

‘Child auctioneers have always existed in Gotham’s crime syndicate.’

‘And I haven’t always been the king of Gotham’s crime syndicate.’

_Zero._

Their fingers are beginning to coil together. Oswald muses at the sensation, still in constant expectation that touching Jim will feel like a jolt of electricity, but every time it just floods him like the warmth of retreating into a safe home from a bitter, winter gale. Jim muses too, at how he can pluck anything worthwhile from the violent turbulence of Oswald’s actions and the hideous trenches of his mind, but here it is, all in a poisoned drink for a monster that even a devil cannot stomach. 


End file.
